No. 1: Live in every inch of your house, right now.

You know your kids are going to mess this up, right?



Here's what I mean - the difference between a house, be it high or humble, and a home are the people who live in it. Honoring that fact should be what informs any decoration. If you have things that are so precious that it makes you anxious to have your small children within ten feet of them, you might have discovered a delicious opportunity to teach your children value - what is important, how to care for something fragile, and how to live within the soft boundaries of a given season of life.

Relationship, respect, reality.

High expectations are not unrealistic ones - they respect relationships.

One of our favorite things is the artistic creativity our children express - they are forever writing, drawing, painting, building. It is amazing that this sort of focused play is so relaxing, for all of us, and also drives the ability to concentrate - play begets good work product, as it turns out. Because we appreciate that so deeply as part of their developing character, and because they live in this home, and influence every inch of it, we've decided to display their artwork in a gallery of sorts - our hallway. There's just one small catch - our hallway currently looks like this:



and this:






Oh, my, when will the magic hallway painting fairy return, considering she's been MIA for like three weeks? Check back later, I'm going to try and reach her on her cell, and share with her my high, but realistic, expectations....